


Self

by Shay_Nioum



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Dysphoria, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, MTF Deceit, Trans Deceit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-25
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-10-16 01:23:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17540030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shay_Nioum/pseuds/Shay_Nioum
Summary: There are times when Deceit feels free, free to be himself or to not be himself at all.





	Self

Standing in front of the mirror that took up a good section of his wall, the fabric of a lengthy skirt flowed back and forth as it was pinched between two fingers that were painted black. A lazy almost serene smile darted over Deceit’s face as he looked at his own reflection, the smooth and silky shirt brushed against his legs in a most relaxing way earning a smile that honestly had felt so damn hard to put up anywhere else. Being here among his room, where he knew that no one else could see him, his dress up games, or the patches of scales he allowed the dim lighting and cool air of his room to finally touch. A place filled sigh swept through him as his eyes drifted shut for a moment, he could imagine it, never taking the skirt off, or in fact, taking the skirt off in order to replace it with one of his pretty sundresses that would just barely graze his knees.

“That would be nice...wouldn’t it?” He asked his reflection, as he released the fabric of his skirt letting the hem of the fabric fall against his ankles as he took a single step forward. His movements were slow, sluggish even as he rested his forehead against the mirror, the cold glass felt blissful against his warm skin. His stomach churned, “That would be nice.” He whispered again his bottom lip wobbling just for a second, before he captured it between his teeth holding it and his feelings captive for the time being.

Opening his eyes, he could already see it. A lovely flowery hat to keep the sun out of his face, black lipstick smeared to perfection along his bottom and upper lip, emerald green eye shadow that wonderfully accented his scales, and… And a wonderful open back sundress, letting his scales breath, all while allowing him to feel free.

For once.

His stomach churned again, and Deceit pulled away from the mirror, the wish he so desperately wanted to act on no more than a million lightyears away. There was no way it could ever happen, there was no way he could leave his room looking like that...looking like her. He might be Deceit, but even he had to accept some truths in his life, and this was one of them.

“I am not a her,” He sternly told his reflection, and the image grimaced with him after the sour lie left his lips, “They will not accept me, I cannot leave this room looking like this. I’m fine with pretending, it is what I do best. I am Deceit. I am Deceit. I am…” Another grimace as lies filled his mouth and throat, he wanted to choke on them, to not answer the awful churning in his stomach, to ignore the summons. But it would only bring more trouble in the end, that much he knew for certain. The others already suspected enough out of him, if he kept them waiting...it would only make Virg...no Anxiety more wary about his whereabouts.

So it was time to go.

The skirt came off in a flurry, and Deceit’s teeth ground together as he took a deep breath. Looking down at the normal looking black slacks he felt a hatred stirring inside of him, a bitterness that made him want to throw caution to the wind, to say screw it and just wear what he felt most comfortable with. But even he knew that he couldn’t do such a thing, it would be foolish even for him. None of the other sides wore dresses, none of them dressed in skirts, or wore makeup. He’d be a freak to them, or...at least more than he already was. They would turn on him in an instant.

The weight of the cloak on his shoulders felt like cinderblocks in compared to the constrained feeling of the pants around his legs. He wanted to crumple to the ground, to weep and sob, to..to beg for the relief.. The freedom of the skirt he had just worn moments ago.

But he couldn’t.

Sucking up every bit of emotion that tumbled around inside of him like a cyclone tearing up a trailer park, Deceit slipped his hat back into place with a heavily burdened sigh as his shoulders unconsciously sagged. “Here we go,” He plainly muttered barely a hint of disdain in his voice, and standing before his door his fingers just barely resting on the doorknob, he sank down with a sluggish and tired movement, time to put the mask back on and play the part he was born to play. As much as he hated it so, it did need to be done.

It was only upon arriving at the scene, that Deceit couldn’t have possibly regretted showing up any more than he already did. It wasn’t to say that things didn’t look bad, it was just that judging from the worn down, or rather downright exhausted looking sides it was very clear that not only was something wrong, but he had been summoned to somehow fix it. From Roman’s bedraggled appearance, the consistent frown that marred Patton’s tearstained face, Logan’s bone-weary appearance that gave him the look of someone who had been holding the world, Virgil who..honestly looked even more like a raccoon at this point just mere seconds away from breathing fire, and then there was Thomas.

Dear Thomas, who ran his fingers through his hair again and again as the dark circles under his eyes truly let on how little sleep he was getting. As well as the massive duvet that was draped over his shoulders, observing everything below his neck from view. It puzzled him honestly, as his eyebrows scrunched together in clear befuddlement. Just what was going on here, and...why exactly was he being called here in the first place? It was no secret that they hated him, no matter how much Patton had attempted to integrate him into the family, they hated him. That’s all there was to it, he wasn’t allowed around Thomas, much less Virgil, so…

“Why am I not in my bedroom?” The jumbled up mixture of words left his mouth in a heaping mess as his heterochromic eyes darted around, from each worn down side, lingering just a moment before his eyes eventually trailed on over to their host. But even then he couldn’t meet Thomas’ gaze, instead, he allowed his eyes to sink to the very bottom of the blanket that was draped like a cape around Thomas’ shoulders.

It took no time at all for the snarl to curl along Virgil’s lips as he took a single step forward, just to almost immediately be halted by Logan’s hand resting on his shoulder. “I don’t know Deceit, you certainly took your time getting here. Why don’t you tell us what’s going on? What have you been doing when we aren’t around? What schemes are you up to? What freakish-”

Virgil’s harsh biting words dissolved away like a mist inside Deceit’s brain as fear clenched its frozen fist over his heart and squeezed tight as soon as the other sides’ eyes all locked onto him, they were all waiting for an answer, something to tell them that he was either guilty or...well there was no other alternative to it. He would always be guilty in their eyes, wouldn’t he? He would have always done something wrong, be it showing up a little bit too late for a video, something going wrong with Thomas..or just anything in their life really. He would always do something wrong.

There was no escape..

_ No escape. No escape. No escape. No escape. No escape! _

The fabric of his pants felt as it was strangling his lower body, twisting him and pulling him down into an ocean of fear, all while the weight of his cloak bore down on him more and more just waiting for him to bend and break under the weight. His clothing screamed at him, shrieking in his ears like the banshees of the night, taunting and harassing him as it seized him so tightly that it hurt his lungs to breathe. There was no escape, none and he would never get away from hi-

“Virgil! That’s enough!”

Deceit’s shoulders broke away from the tight grip that had held his shoulders captive as he struggled to breath in a single lungful of air. The word blurred and spun around him as Logan forced himself between the anxious side and Deceit, blinking rapidly the fog before him cleared and both Logan and Virgil’s worry filled face came into view. Their own exhaustion seemed to pale in comparison to the downright terror scrawled over their faces and in their eyes. And even so, it certainly didn’t stop Virgil from pressing against the logical side, attempting to get past him even now.

“He wasn’t breathing Logan,” Virgil hissed, a pure sense of desperation filling his words as Deceit stumbled back away from him, away from all of them as soon as Patton moved to touch his shoulder. The shoulder that still ached from Virgil’s impossibly tight grip, and from where the other side had tried to shake the life back into him when it appeared that he had truly died before their very eyes. “He was having a panic attack, I needed to snap him out of it before...before…” Deceit retreated backward yet again, as his face took on an unhealthy pale hue his back thumped solidly against the blinds where Patton most often stood.

His expression said it all, as his fists clenched and unclenched in tandem with his grinding teeth, silence filled the air between them before his gaze snapped back down to his hands. For a split solid second his tongue caught in his throat, where he had expected to see plain yellow gloves hiding his hands, hiding away the evidence of what had he had been doing in the safety of his room there was the glimmer of his nail polish on his fingernails looking back at him in the lighting of the living room. Fear curled in his throat like the sickly sensation of vomit rising back up.

In that very moment, as he looked back at the others he saw the truth on their faces as their eyes followed his own line of sight towards the damning evidence, and in that very moment as his mind whispered to him but one word and one word only. The very word that made his hat topple off of his head, as he ducked down before Patton could think to reach out, hell before Roman could even think to lunge forward and stop him. His inner voice told him but one thing.

 _Run_.

And in that very moment, he was not Deceit, but rather Self-Preservation.

 


End file.
